Vision

The vision of the California Sex Offender Management Board (CASOMB) is to decrease sexual victimization and increase community safety.

Mission

The vision will be accomplished by addressing issues, concerns and problems related to community management of adult sex offenders by identifying and developing recommendations to improve policies and practices.

Background:

On September 20, 2006, Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed Assembly Bill 1015, which created the California Sex Offender Management Board (CASOMB). The bill had been introduced by Assembly Members Judy Chu and Todd Spitzer and passed the California Legislature with nearly unanimous bipartisan support.

Because California is the most populated state in the Union and has had lifetime registration for its convicted sex offenders since 1947, California has more registered sex offenders than any other state with about 88,000 identified sex offenders (per Department of Justice, August 2007). Currently, the California Department of Corrections and Rehabilitation (CDCR) supervises about 10,000 of those 88,000 sex offenders, of which about 3,200 have been designated as High Risk Sex Offenders (CDCR Housing Summit, March 2007). Additionally, there are about 22,500 adult sex offenders serving time in one of 32 state prisons operated by CDCR (California Sex Offender Management Task Force Report, July 2007).

While it is commonly believed that most sexual assaults are committed by strangers, the research suggests that the overwhelming majority of sex offenders victimize people known to them; approximately 90 percent of child victims know their offenders, as do 80 percent of adult victims [per Kilpatrick, D.G., Edmunds, C.N., & Seymour, A.K. (1992) Rape in America: A Report to the Nation. Arlington, VA: National Victim Center].